Monday, January 9, 2012

Spinach Banana Rice Omelet Scramble

You have leftover white rice in the fridge (from yesterday's BRAT diet), but since you're getting over a stomach virus, you don't want to eat anything too controversial, so fried rice is out. You want protein, but it's breakfast. So how about...a Spinach Banana Rice Omelet Scramble?


Wilt a handful of baby spinach in a medium-hot nonstick skillet. Set aside. Layer thin slices of banana on the skillet, cook until the undersides are dark brown. Reduce heat a bit, pour three well-scrambled eggs (or four egg whites) over bananas, let sit 30 seconds. Add a half cup of rice, drizzle very lightly and unevenly with soy sauce (or, better, Filipino calamansi soy sauce, which has a citrusy edge from the calamansi), gently scramble with spatula, reduce heat to low and let sit, covered, or a minute or two. Finish with a generous drizzling of good quality extra virgin olive oil.

Look, I completely understand how randomly juvenile and ditzy this seems. It's one of my dopier kitchen moves. But, really, it worked. And, for easing one's way back to "real food" after a stomach bug, it worked great. It reminded me a little of the sweet plantain omelettes at the wonderful La Carreta chain of Cuban luncheonettes in Miami (there's one right in the airport).

The soy flavor catches onto the dark caramelization of the bananas. The clumps in the leftover rice seem pleasantly breakfasty/curdy/starchy (I wouldn't want this dish for lunch or dinner). The spinach and egg are omelette-ish, and the olive oil binds them all, and surprisingly doesn't conflict with the soy. Between the soy sauce and the banana, blandness was banished, and between the rice and the egg, stomach-settling ease was guaranteed.

I swear, it hung together. Some onion might have made a nice addition, but if you're going to sautee chopped onion, then you might as well fry the banana, and then you'd have a whole other dish...

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